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 Cptn_Snuggles wrote:
Twice I had the opponent castle up in a corner, and really could have used some serious ranged firepower or artillery to make them disperse. Has anyone had any luck with guard artillery?

Why not tuck in a Leman Russ or two, I tend to find that they can soak up a fair few shots themselves and gives you that pie plate that is always useful.

otherwise I do like having a squad or two of Acolytes with Democharges

 Cptn_Snuggles wrote:
So after Adepticon and 8 games played with GSC I was faced with a situation (FYI one was during the Warhammer TV stream, we were luckily enough to be broadcasted Saturday night!).

Twice I had the opponent castle up in a corner, and really could have used some serious ranged firepower or artillery to make them disperse. Has anyone had any luck with guard artillery?

I like the concept of the guard artillery formation or even an allied CAD, but I'm afraid with my GSC tactics of fading in and out, it will be left exposed. Also the points investment would probably need to be 500+ points.

If I break down my list to the core, the brood cycle is around 500 points and I take two sub-T's at around 275 points a piece. Throw in 2 characters and that puts my core in around 1250 give or take. I guess that might leave me enough room to put a semi-effective guard position down. Thoughts?

You the GSC player that lost to my friend's White Scar gladius G1? I think Gladius is just a tough match up for that mission due to obsec.

If you want to bring some arty, check out the Renegades in Imperial Armor. A command squad with Ordinance tyrant, 5 earth shakers arty carriages and 2 Heavy mortars for 420pts

I think that was me. It wasn't so much obsec as my patriarch refused to help out. Without his fearless bubble my big squad got run down and that was a tough blow. GSC isn't too bad of a match up against gladius(assuming a normal number of flame throwers) because we have the raw killing power to really table a BC in a hurry if the battle company isn't careful. The reverse of that though is that they often have enough bolters to really put the pain on all my guys.

 SonsofVulkan wrote:

 Cptn_Snuggles wrote:
So after Adepticon and 8 games played with GSC I was faced with a situation (FYI one was during the Warhammer TV stream, we were luckily enough to be broadcasted Saturday night!).

Twice I had the opponent castle up in a corner, and really could have used some serious ranged firepower or artillery to make them disperse. Has anyone had any luck with guard artillery?

I like the concept of the guard artillery formation or even an allied CAD, but I'm afraid with my GSC tactics of fading in and out, it will be left exposed. Also the points investment would probably need to be 500+ points.

If I break down my list to the core, the brood cycle is around 500 points and I take two sub-T's at around 275 points a piece. Throw in 2 characters and that puts my core in around 1250 give or take. I guess that might leave me enough room to put a semi-effective guard position down. Thoughts?

You the GSC player that lost to my friend's White Scar gladius G1? I think Gladius is just a tough match up for that mission due to obsec.

If you want to bring some arty, check out the Renegades in Imperial Armor. A command squad with Ordinance tyrant, 5 earth shakers arty carriages and 2 Heavy mortars for 420pts

If you play 'come to the apocalypse" I would consider this option also. Best thing about this setup is the cheap high toughness artillery that you can place behind a defence line. If the artillery can hold their own then you got the option to first shoot with them for 3 turns and 'come out of the shadows' with the GSC to take down the leftovers.

@sonsofvulkan: don't you also need two 'normal' troop choice in this setup?

 vercingatorix wrote:
I think that was me. It wasn't so much obsec as my patriarch refused to help out. Without his fearless bubble my big squad got run down and that was a tough blow. GSC isn't too bad of a match up against gladius(assuming a normal number of flame throwers) because we have the raw killing power to really table a BC in a hurry if the battle company isn't careful. The reverse of that though is that they often have enough bolters to really put the pain on all my guys.

Did you make the top 16? My friend said the GSC player he beat still end up making the top 16 by blowing thru the rest of his opponents that day.

True still a tough match up because Gladius players would keep their dudes inside the vehicles, so you have to assault and destroy the rhino/rzb, endure a whole turn of shooting and then you will get the chance to assault the squad. The worse match up would be against a Lionsblade strike force, full BS overwatch is just too overwhelming.

Does anyone consider Abhorrents worth taking?

gave them a go the other day, and wasn't overly impressed with them

GodDamUser wrote:
Does anyone consider Abhorrents worth taking?

gave them a go the other day, and wasn't overly impressed with them

I would say they are not very efficient considering Claw morphs can do everything they can for much less and if you need resilency I'd rather go with genestealers again for cheaper. They are not bad to summon if you don't have any useful other options modeled/painted but normally they stay in the box.

 SonsofVulkan wrote:

 vercingatorix wrote:
I think that was me. It wasn't so much obsec as my patriarch refused to help out. Without his fearless bubble my big squad got run down and that was a tough blow. GSC isn't too bad of a match up against gladius(assuming a normal number of flame throwers) because we have the raw killing power to really table a BC in a hurry if the battle company isn't careful. The reverse of that though is that they often have enough bolters to really put the pain on all my guys.

Did you make the top 16? My friend said the GSC player he beat still end up making the top 16 by blowing thru the rest of his opponents that day.

True still a tough match up because Gladius players would keep their dudes inside the vehicles, so you have to assault and destroy the rhino/rzb, endure a whole turn of shooting and then you will get the chance to assault the squad. The worse match up would be against a Lionsblade strike force, full BS overwatch is just too overwhelming.

I did and I actually beat a lions blade w/ wolves along the way. We ended on bottom of 2 with him technically winning but I had 10 killpoints from his battle company and all but 2 wolves were dead. We called it there.

I've found that the trick is playing with unit layering so that after the first guy dies then the rest are shooting through a gap in a unit so you get a 5+ and 6+ fnp. Because of coteaz and +4 to seize that game I could confidently set up in the middle of the board do tricks like that. I also didn't roll many 6's on turn 1 but a bunch of 5s. So half my army shot twice in turn 1. With all the lasguns plus 3 quad mortars there was a lot of dead wolves and he was locked in combat with 1 remaining guy.

When I play against lions blade with my regular ITC army I have a patriarch plus 5 magus I rely on shrieks and mass hypnosis. Overwatch is a lot less scary at B3 and you should wipe the squad before they swing. Shriek is just good at picking up models.

Also I have 60 neophytes in my army which usually pick up guys that step out of their trucks. It's a hard match up but its not awful if you bring enough wounds.

What's considered the best loadout for neophyte hybrids? Just got my first box besides Overkill and am hoping to get more of a gcult army in the future.

Depends on what you plan to do with the unit..

But for the Ambushes, I do love me some Flamers

Still yet to test out the seismic cannon myself.. looks nice on paper..

GodDamUser wrote:
Does anyone consider Abhorrents worth taking?

gave them a go the other day, and wasn't overly impressed with them

I've been running two squads in a Subterrain Uprising lately in low point games with good success. One squad is equipped with all power picks and serves as the bodyguard for a Primus (lots of AP3) while the other has all hammers and is used to support the Acolyte and Metamorph squads. As a stand-alone squad I think the Hammers are slightly more useful since they have S8 (or S9 with Furious Charge or Might from Beyond, S10 with both) and guaranteed AP2 with Concussive (took down a Wraithknight once by Concussing it with a Hammer and then rending it to death next round), but the Power Picks are still nice for disposing of Marine squads and monstrous creatures. Never mix weapons, as it splits their target priorities and reduces their efficiency.

Also in regards to the comparison to Claw-morphs, Aberrants are similar in that they are a high strength melee squad, but they offer guaranteed armor penetration and swing at higher strengths (S7 for picks and S8 for Hammers) at the cost of no shooting and fewer attacks overall (Picks have the same number of attacks as Metamorphs per model, but generally fewer bodies due to higher individual cost) . They also come with Stubborn built in, so they aren't as vulnerable to getting swept as Metamorphs are if combat doesn't go as well as expected.

 Cptn_Snuggles wrote:
So after Adepticon and 8 games played with GSC I was faced with a situation (FYI one was during the Warhammer TV stream, we were luckily enough to be broadcasted Saturday night!).

Twice I had the opponent castle up in a corner, and really could have used some serious ranged firepower or artillery to make them disperse. Has anyone had any luck with guard artillery?

I like the concept of the guard artillery formation or even an allied CAD, but I'm afraid with my GSC tactics of fading in and out, it will be left exposed. Also the points investment would probably need to be 500+ points.

If I break down my list to the core, the brood cycle is around 500 points and I take two sub-T's at around 275 points a piece. Throw in 2 characters and that puts my core in around 1250 give or take. I guess that might leave me enough room to put a semi-effective guard position down. Thoughts?

A lord comissar with vets and a unit of wyverns is super cheap actually.

 Cptn_Snuggles wrote:
So after Adepticon and 8 games played with GSC I was faced with a situation (FYI one was during the Warhammer TV stream, we were luckily enough to be broadcasted Saturday night!).

Per chance, were you the fellow with the lovely yellow/grey suited hybrids? Was a bit disappointed to only see two Genestealer Cults while we were there and only saw one of them in person.

 Cptn_Snuggles wrote:

I like the concept of the guard artillery formation or even an allied CAD, but I'm afraid with my GSC tactics of fading in and out, it will be left exposed. Also the points investment would probably need to be 500+ points.

If I break down my list to the core, the brood cycle is around 500 points and I take two sub-T's at around 275 points a piece. Throw in 2 characters and that puts my core in around 1250 give or take. I guess that might leave me enough room to put a semi-effective guard position down. Thoughts?

A Guard allied detatchment with a Commissar Lord, bare Veteran Squad, and 3 Wyverns comes to 320 points, so not too bad. Alternatively, one could consider the Living Artillery Node from the Tyranids. It is a bit more expensive at 390 points minimum, but the individual components are a bit tougher and can fight in melee in a pinch, plus the Exocrine offers some BS:4 plasma firepower without the drawback of Gets Hot.

Isn't there an Imperial Guard formation with just artillery? It would help not to pay the tax for those other units, right?

Red Corsair wrote:A lord comissar with vets and a unit of wyverns is super cheap actually.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:Isn't there an Imperial Guard formation with just artillery? It would help not to pay the tax for those other units, right?

I would rather pick the 'non vehicle' Renegade artillery units. If the GSC units don't get first turn then the should be able to stay in the backfield and go to the shadows and start playing the second turn.

The renegade artillery can be put behind a defence line or cover and with toughness 7 + coversave the can take a bit of shooting.

You could also deploy the GSC in their face, take first turn shooting, go into the shadows and replenish models and start shooting with the artillery.

A few wyverns got a 'big bulls eye' on their face and can be destroyed with a single (melta) shot.

It requires a CCS in a chimera, and manticore/deathstrike before you can unlock two units of wyverns/basilisks/hydras. It's not really less of a tax than the CAD or allied detachment if you mainly want the wyverns.

Renegades of vraks have better artillery options. A 390pts CAD with a command squad, and squads of zombies can get you four wyverns so is probably better than the IG allied detachment mentioned above. It does have the drawbacks of being desperate allies and FW though depending on tournament restrictions.

Oh well I was beaten to mentioning R+H by shogun haha Their other artillery options are great too of course!

 Strat_N8 wrote:

 Cptn_Snuggles wrote:
So after Adepticon and 8 games played with GSC I was faced with a situation (FYI one was during the Warhammer TV stream, we were luckily enough to be broadcasted Saturday night!).

Per chance, were you the fellow with the lovely yellow/grey suited hybrids? Was a bit disappointed to only see two Genestealer Cults while we were there and only saw one of them in person.

 Cptn_Snuggles wrote:

I like the concept of the guard artillery formation or even an allied CAD, but I'm afraid with my GSC tactics of fading in and out, it will be left exposed. Also the points investment would probably need to be 500+ points.

If I break down my list to the core, the brood cycle is around 500 points and I take two sub-T's at around 275 points a piece. Throw in 2 characters and that puts my core in around 1250 give or take. I guess that might leave me enough room to put a semi-effective guard position down. Thoughts?

A Guard allied detatchment with a Commissar Lord, bare Veteran Squad, and 3 Wyverns comes to 320 points, so not too bad. Alternatively, one could consider the Living Artillery Node from the Tyranids. It is a bit more expensive at 390 points minimum, but the individual components are a bit tougher and can fight in melee in a pinch, plus the Exocrine offers some BS:4 plasma firepower without the drawback of Gets Hot.

I went with a beige armor and red flesh tones. Here is a picture of my champs list, and here is our team tournament list (I did the painting for all the non-guard stuff). I so need a break from painting cult even though I want to add more. They burned me out!

Here are the two photos:

Beautiful army - it's impressive to get such a large force to such a high standard!

Seriously Awesome. It's tough getting together enough guys to a good quality. Especially because paint judging is never an average of your models. It's usually a measure of your worst and your best model. If you have an average army with no glaring weaknesses paint wise with two big awesome models, you'll often max paint score or at least beat someone with merely an above average army. That's what makes hordes so difficult IMO. There's no 1 big stand out model to make them not look to closely at everything.

thanks guys. Yeah it really burnt me out. Painted it all basically in a couple of months. The color pallet was way too large on this army, I chose poorly when I set my paint plan. I'm taking a break and painting some 30k marines to get a break from the complexity of the cult!

I really do want to revisit them though. They are such an exhausting army to play with all of the redeployment and cat & mouse tactics you need to employ. It's not a point and click army like some of the net lists these days.

Have people had any luck with the cult as a small allied force? I'm thinking of a full imperial guard artillery army, medusas, quad mortars, basilisk, blob squad and then adding in a sub uprising or something? I don't have the models but I think it would do well.

I'd been considering exactly that - I'd imagine a sub uprising or two could perform quite well outside the insurrection with min acolyte squads and some claw morphs. My main issue would be where to deploy them all as my deployment zone is usually 100% full of guardsmen...

Considering you don't need to worry too much about killing since you have a bunch of artillery for that maybe going with obsec over two rolls on the cult ambush table. Just use another 80 neophytes as obsec and quickly moving. Basically a cheap way of giving turn 2 infiltrate to guardsman. It would be an exhausting army to play but most armies don't have an effective way of getting rid of that many bodies.

Hello all,

Went to the Crucible GT this past weekend, thought I would share my results with the group. My list was a barebones Cult Insurrection with all 4 HQs, and a SubUp with 3 units of Claw Morphs. One was 10 man for the primus, and there were 10 Stealers for the patriarch in my Brood Cycle. Added on 3 flyrants to round it out.

Game 1 was against a WarCon with Cawl, sisters of silence and an Inquisitor with servo skulls. Went second, hid far away and went into reserves. Turn 2 I came in hard and destroyed both of his grav squads and his sicarans and infiltrators. By turn 3 his knight was dead to flyrants and his whole army was locked in combat. Called it there, full point win.

Game 2 was against WarCon with Cawl and sisters, no Inquisitor. Went 2nd again. Had some really poor cult ambush rolls turn 2 so he was able to keep a good amount of his army alive, he also shot down two flyrants with that skyfire grav unit. The game only went to 4, but he managed to tie one primary, while I won Maelstrom. A very comfortable win, 14-5. If it goes to 5 I probably get full points, as I needed one more kill point and was about to charge most of my army into some Grav Bots with Cawl.

Game 3 was against a Tau player with servo skulls (farsight decurion with Insertion force, Piranha wing and Triptide wing, and inquisitor). I went first, and he mistakenly deployed a servo skull within 6" of his Tau, so it was pulled for being within 6" of the enemy (as he's desperate allies). I had some horrendous dice rolls, and only managed to assault one unit since no less than 7 of my units managed to Cult ambush walk on my board, or outflanked on the far side out of range of anything. Still got a kill 3 Maelstrom successfully and killed his warlord. He matched my Kill 3 when his Riptide Wing (all VTs) managed to gun down two flyrants after some truly awful armor saves on my part. I believe I failed 6 consecutive 3+ saves! It was back and forth since the dual primaries were Table quarters and kill points, which we both easily won one of. The game swung in his favor when I went for hold 3, and he was able to contest it with a piranha Flat outing onto it. I forgot they could turbo 18"! Ended up in a loss, 16-7 in his favor as he narrowly held the maelstrom.

Game 4 I managed to play against Tau with servo skulls again! Your standard double-surge list with triptide wing, and an inquisitor. I went 2nd and he got a quick hold 3 in maelstrom as I was far away. Turn 2 my cult ambushes came in and I managed to lock up most of his MCs. His surges eventually stomped their way out and I never was able to kill them, but I did crush the riptides and all his crisis and markerlight support. Sadly he got a kill 3 and kill 2 Maelstrom to maintain a slight lead on it as my first turn I got 0. Won the primary (end of game) but lost maelstrom for a dead tie. He had warlord solo blood, I had Linebreaker and warlord. If the game goes onto turn 6 I almost certainly win as he was down to two units and I was only a point shy on maelstrom, while he was never going to get the Primary.

Game 5 was, yet again, Tau! Sadly I went second as he had no skulls. His list was a triptide wing, two yvahras and an R'Varna (loads of large blasts). I go second so I castle up to jump to the shadows turn 1. Cleverly, he jumps a Yvahra straight at me and actually solos a flyrant by charging it to do one wound. I only get half my army into the shadows because he's so close. Patriarch and stealers take the yvahra down to one wound, only for it to pass a Nova and go into reserves out of combat. I also summon some stealers into his backfield to contest an objective and roll a 6, so they charge the R'Varna and tear it to pieces. My turn 2 I manage to lock two tides in combat and then charge the summoned stealers that had gotten free into the third, tying them all up for the rest of the game. His two yvahras buzz around but Im able to shoot the one wound guy left down with my last flyrant, and poor guys into the riptide combats until they die. The game ends on 5 with him having two of his 6 tides left, both locked in combat. Solid win for me. We draw maelstrom but I solidly win primary for a 15-7 win for me.

Thoughts from the tournament: Tau with servo skulls are so, so bad for us! Really poor luck in my matchups and in that game I lost (my opponent ended up making it to top table before losing to the winning daemon player) but I had a great time overall. No games was I ever out of the picture to win, and the army is super fun to play. Three servo skull opponents and 3 Tau players really broke my heart though, as there were only 5 tau armies in a field of 52 players. I would've loved to see some Eldar instead... Ended up in 9th place and top Nid, which isnt too bad but I'll admit I was hoping for more.

Things I have noticed with the army is that if you go second and dont have summoning, the maelstrom can be tough as you have a solid deficit that you need to make up quickly. Going second against tau in games 4 and 5 I needed one more turn to catch up as they had strong early leads. Against non-Tau armies I havent had any trouble as I can usually cut off their points as they cant intercept me when I come to steal objectives that they had been trying to hold, but Tau can shoot off the few units I get close. Overall it was great time, I'd definitely recommend coming to florida for some of the GTs here, they're highly competitive!

Holy smokes that was poor match ups. Excellent job though I doubt I could have kept my cool lining august Tau and servo skulls all day.

How did the flyrants perform against Tau? The biggest reason I've been against mixing them is that I feel like riptides are ALSO good against them which is the one match up I'd be trying to fix if with allies.

Did you get the chance to take over the stormsurge?

How much bubble wrap did the tau players bring? Do you think they could have played it better against you? I know most people haven't played against GSC hardly at all. So far that's been my biggest advantage.

I also run 10 stealers with the Patriarch. It just feels like the right amount. Glad someone else thinks the same way.


My strategy against Tau has just been to rely on sheer number of wounds between summoning and bringing 60 neophytes anyway. How bad is the intercept? I'm surprised you managed to lock up as much as you did.

Do you think summoning stealers was the right call? Couldn't 20 neophytes have locked up the riptide just as effectively? I get that it could very well be a model limitation.

I think that's about all my questions....

The Flyrants were very underwhelming in all three tau games, only thing they did was vs the surge list Land on turn 5 for Objectives. And no, I sadly failed to get mind control against the surges. I only have 5 rolls on broodmind since I don't take a CaD. :( and yeah the tau could've played better. My last opponent spread out too much so I was able to isolate and lock up his tides with minimal overwatch. But the game I lost was against my chief rival, who knows my army inside and out cause we've played quite a few times. He did all the right things other than the Skull snafu. And the reason I summoned the Stealers not Guard was because I wanted a legit Cc threat that I expected to take a lot of shooting. I was going to summon them into terrain where stealth and T4 and a 5++ would help CS weight of fire and smart missiles. But, when I rolled the 6, I felt good about the choice!

I look at it as a riptide locked in combat with 20 neophytes is guaranteed to be out of commission for a while, basically forever if a patriarch is nearby. While Genestealers could get killed in a few rounds of combat.

Also 20 neophytes is more resistant to shooting then 8 stealers or at least equal.

I have the models for both and I've been going back and forth on it so that's why I was curious about it.

And actually, doing the math. Assuming the neophytes lose 3 in overwatch and 8 stealers lose 2 and there are no bubbles. The neophytes actually do more wounds between pistols, mass swings, and the guy with an AP 2 power maul.

Neophytes do 2.2 wounds and Stealers do 1.8. It only gets worse if the Riptide is in cover and swings first.

Ignore above, apparently power mauls need to wound? lol. So the neophytes are worse then by a decent amount but still well within a standard deviation.

Lol power mails are ap 4 sadly. And this was an R'Varna, so it actually has no overwatch. Meant I got all 8 swinging and did a solid 4 wounds in CC with those 40 attacks.

Oh, is that the tank of a riptide that has extra wounds and toughness? That would make sense then, the poor little guys couldn't even hurt him. With that being said, I still don't mind neutralizing it by just locking him in combat forever.

How did you get 40? You only summon 8 at most? Or do you mean from your purestrains with the patriarch?

I summoned 8 for 40 attacks. They're 3 base and they all had ScyTals because summoned, then they charged for 5 attacks each.