Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 MagicJuggler wrote:
The thing was Psykers themselves weren't actually *that* crazy outside of Daemon flying Circuses, or said Deathstars. Running multiple small Psykers was less efficient than having one or two big Psykers (or a Conclave) to serve as a focal point for all the tertiary Warp Charge. Armies like pure GK or Thousand Sons were actually pretty horrible, and nobody ever ran Warlocks outside of a Conclave (and even that's a stretch).

The "Psychic Focus"/only being able to attempt a power once per turn means you want to cast those powers with the Psyker most likely to succeed. Naturally, this means Magnus.

The more things change...

90% of psychic craziness back in 7th were Deathstars and Daemon summoning, at least in competitive play. Otherwise, psychic was fairly mild.

I like the restrictions and simplicity on the new psychic powers, even if that does make the psychic phase nowadays somewhat bland. However, the meta has shifted. Horde I'm pretty certain will be consistently strong. Flyer builds remain to be seen, even though they've had some early success.

 Primark G wrote:
Magnus was your MVP this game... he did a lot of heavy lifting. I think Orks could have won if he had died earlier. Being able to get him up to T8 is a really big deal and really helped versus those flyers.

Agreed. Magnus took out the Giant Squiggoth, a unit with almost 2x the Wounds of Magnus. He also took out 2 warbosses. Most importantly, he was a great fire magnet which took away the heat from the rest of my army for a full 2 turns. All this despite not taking advantage of the Changeling's -1 bubble of protection.

GhostRecon wrote:
Forgot about the 4++ with Tzeench. Yeah - ouch. Burna-Bombas might get away with flying obliques since they can drop if they fly over even a sliver of the unit, but yeah you do have so many Brimstone horrors it'd still be hard to find a place to go.

I do think the killtank might be a slightly better option - about the same volume of shooting (6d6 on a gigashoota, for example, vs 2x 3D6 w/two supalobbbas) at BS4+ that can move and shoot - GSquig gets 5+ and has no ability to allow it to move and shoot heavy weapons; a bit cheaper, too. GSquig is definitely more resilient and makes a great 'fortress anchor' with all those shootas and no negative modifier to its passengers' shooting.

This kind of horde list, though, definitely feels like a good hard-counter to the flier spam lists. Makes me wonder how a green tide list would do against it.

Do you/Does anybody happen to know what the Orc list was that got 2nd place at the Caledonian GT was? Mostly focused on the Orks in this case to try and see how they might counter jy2's list - since it won this match up!

I think the Green Tide is the best Ork build to play against this list. Heck, the Green Tide should be a great TAC Ork list against most of the armies out there.

The weakness of my Tzeentch list is its low output offensively. Sure, my army may be super-resilient. However, its offense is at only a fraction of its defensive prowess. I think my list would actually have a tougher time against another horde army. The Green Tide has the 2 traits going for it - 1) it's got a high-model count and 2) it can generate an enormous amount of dice on offense.

I may have to tweak my list to account for another horde army. Tweaks may include adding more Exalted Flamers or another counter-attack horde-based unit (i.e. perhaps a large block of bloodletters or daemonettes).

 Ratius wrote:
Those dakkajets simply were not the correct platform for killing Magnus, although granted thats all he really had.
Even with 106 shots.
Hitting on 4s is 53 hits.
Then wounding on 5s equals about 17 wounds.
Magnus has a 3++ (?). So thats about 6W a turn assuming he dosent CP any saves and if he got above average luck you can take it as about 5W a turn. It would have taken him roughly 3-4 full turns of ploughing everything he had into him.
Just a mismatch overall imho.

You should play your SW Dread list VS this list JY2. Just out of interest!

As currently constructed, the Tzeentch list should be able to beat my SW Dread list hands-down in any objectives game. While my Walking Dread list is a TAC list, it is also more of a generalist list. To combat my Brimming With Horror list, you'd have to run a specialist list - a list that specializes in huge damage output. My Walking Dread list just does not generate enough damage against the Tzeentch army. I'd have to tweak it somewhat (and actually, I've already done that....now I just have to test it out).

BTW, Magnus is 3+/4++ re-roll 1's. For most of the time, I was making saves using his 4++ due to AP -1 on the Dakkajets.

 jy2 wrote:

 MagicJuggler wrote:
The thing was Psykers themselves weren't actually *that* crazy outside of Daemon flying Circuses, or said Deathstars. Running multiple small Psykers was less efficient than having one or two big Psykers (or a Conclave) to serve as a focal point for all the tertiary Warp Charge. Armies like pure GK or Thousand Sons were actually pretty horrible, and nobody ever ran Warlocks outside of a Conclave (and even that's a stretch).

The "Psychic Focus"/only being able to attempt a power once per turn means you want to cast those powers with the Psyker most likely to succeed. Naturally, this means Magnus.

The more things change...

90% of psychic craziness back in 7th were Deathstars and Daemon summoning, at least in competitive play. Otherwise, psychic was fairly mild.

I like the restrictions and simplicity on the new psychic powers, even if that does make the psychic phase nowadays somewhat bland. However, the meta has shifted. Horde I'm pretty certain will be consistently strong. Flyer builds remain to be seen, even though they've had some early success.

The main things I remember about 7e Psykers was that Summonspam itself wasn't anywhere as powerful as summons to follow up after negating your opponent's range. A single Eldar Farseer with Mantle in a Serpentspam build was more powerful than a bunch of Heralds attempting to summon. Ditto a Flying Circus with a Magnus alphastrike.

In either case, the problems with Psykers in 8th are similar enough to 7th or most other editions: They just don't properly scale upwards, and manifesting and denying is "all or nothing".

 jy2 wrote:

I think the Green Tide is the best Ork build to play against this list. Heck, the Green Tide should be a great TAC Ork list against most of the armies out there. 

Do you see "dice fatigue" becoming more of a thing this edition, especially if you end up in odd situations like Ynnari Flocks vs Ynnari Flocks, Conscript on Conscript action, etc? Or even seeing "dice apps" becoming more of a thing for tournament play? I remember reading Matt Root's 2015 LVO Batreps, and his second game with his Green Tide was against...another Green Tide!

 MagicJuggler wrote:
Do you see "dice fatigue" becoming more of a thing this edition, especially if you end up in odd situations like Ynnari Flocks vs Ynnari Flocks, Conscript on Conscript action, etc? Or even seeing "dice apps" becoming more of a thing for tournament play? I remember reading Matt Root's 2015 LVO Batreps, and his second game with his Green Tide was against...another Green Tide!

It's hard to say for sure. While you might see more dice due to the proliferation of the horde army, there's also not as much re-rolls in this edition as there was in 7th (though all that might change when the new codices start coming out). You will see tournaments slow down somewhat, but eventually, I think the tournament scene will re-adjust itself as people start to get better at playing hordes or perhaps even slim down on their "hordy-ness" armies (like I am planning to slim down on how many Brimstones I will be running).

We'll just have to wait and see.

Not sure what the play was here. Magnus is too hard to kill but too strong to ignore, and he doesn't lose much from his damage table.

Jy2: what SM/Imperial options do you see taking this list on successfully? TBH I'm somewhat struggling due to the -1 to hit AND 4++ re-roll 1s

So far (pre-codex, but really, what could Chapter Tactics add?) it feels like any sort of tactical/scout/bike play doesn't really feel like it could ever compete with that. Poor bikes got so expensive! 2 wound models without invuln saves just don't feel worth the cost given all the 2 damage stuff that's prevalent.

Right now I'm going for more of a:

block of conscripts
couple of scion squads
eversor assasin for backfield objective taking (70 points seems too good to pass up for a durable deepstriker that can reliably charge)
1 taurox prime

Roboute
Fire Raptor
Dakka Leviathan Dread
2 x quad mortar (now legal due to faq, yay)
Whirlwind Scorpius

So the "imperial soup" method with a hordy frontline to give me as many shooting turns as possible. Even then, with all that shooting both indirect/direct i still dont see how it would deal with 200 4++ wounds well.


Second question: can the next battle-report be this list vs the genestealer/artillary/conscript ball that's been floating around? (120 conscripts, 80 genestealears, something like 9 earthshaker cannons). Be curious which side wins that one.

It'd be a more interesting test if he had a footslogging horde with buff characters. I think that the only competitive units the ork player fielded were warbosses and a garg squiggoth. Dakkajets are just not worth the points and his list consisted of mostly dakkajets.

 koooaei wrote:
It'd be a more interesting test if he had a footslogging horde with buff characters. I think that the only competitive units the ork player fielded were warbosses and a garg squiggoth. Dakkajets are just not worth the points and his list consisted of mostly dakkajets.

even the war bosses were questionable.

Personally I think green tide is strong but can't hold up to the efficiency of gene-cult 40x genestealer swarm w patriarch (detachment 1 ~500pts) backed up by conscript 2x 50 model blob w commissar and commander maybe some scion plasma drops w some taurox gattling guns and crack shot dkok engineers (detachment 2 ~750)and if you really want some heavy hitters or anti flyers back it up w a tyranid detachment w a flyrant or swarmlord and chaff (detachment 3 ~750) or take broken forgeworld artillery that lacks half the rules it should have like manticores that can fire all 4 missiles turn 1 and basilisk carrriagee that cost almost nothing. That's 200+ models that is mostly morale immune and shoots brilliantly and assaults savagely and with a lot of anti tank and anti flyer and some psychers and high invul characters. < post FAQ and without fw fixes to certain artillery this has to be the strongest list.

Honestly the ork player should have 3 way charged magnus with the warbosses and the squiggoth. I'm guessing he was afraid of it dying. But that's an extra unit that gets to attack, more chances for you to split attacks and do less to each unit, plus the squiggoth inflicts d6 mortal wounds when charging. That could have been critical on keeping the warbosses alive.

 JohnU wrote:
Not sure what the play was here. Magnus is too hard to kill but too strong to ignore, and he doesn't lose much from his damage table.

Yeah, he's good. His only weakness is that he can be targeted and more easily killed by armies with good firepower.

Largo39 wrote:
Jy2: what SM/Imperial options do you see taking this list on successfully? TBH I'm somewhat struggling due to the -1 to hit AND 4++ re-roll 1s

So far (pre-codex, but really, what could Chapter Tactics add?) it feels like any sort of tactical/scout/bike play doesn't really feel like it could ever compete with that. Poor bikes got so expensive! 2 wound models without invuln saves just don't feel worth the cost given all the 2 damage stuff that's prevalent.

Right now I'm going for more of a:

block of conscripts
couple of scion squads
eversor assasin for backfield objective taking (70 points seems too good to pass up for a durable deepstriker that can reliably charge)
1 taurox prime

Roboute
Fire Raptor
Dakka Leviathan Dread
2 x quad mortar (now legal due to faq, yay)
Whirlwind Scorpius

So the "imperial soup" method with a hordy frontline to give me as many shooting turns as possible. Even then, with all that shooting both indirect/direct i still dont see how it would deal with 200 4++ wounds well.


Second question: can the next battle-report be this list vs the genestealer/artillary/conscript ball that's been floating around? (120 conscripts, 80 genestealears, something like 9 earthshaker cannons). Be curious which side wins that one.

If I were building an Imperial TAC list that can deal with hordes as well as everything else, I'd go with these:

1. HQ that allows for re-rolls. Guilliman is perfect for this. Others can include Pedro or Calgar. On the cheap side, maybe a Captain.

2. Efficient high-powered and high-volume shooting. High-powered is for vehicles, monsters and other elite units. High-volume is for hordes. Fire Raptor is good (though expensive). Leviathan dread is somewhat pricey though very durable. He's flexible with the different types of weaponry but IMO he isn't the most efficient. Quad Mortars are good. Scorpius is more of a niche unit, but its got its uses and I can't complain about its firepower. You've got efficient units like the Rifleman Dreads (2x Twin Autocannons) or Mortis Dreads (2x Twin Heavy Bolters). There are many other good options, though that'll take some research of the codices.

3. You need to spam the efficient units. That's the best way to have huge offensive output in your army. Unfortunately, it takes spam to fight spam. Horde lists are an extreme army. You need to specialize your army in order to deal with an extreme army. Generalist lists, while they have a lot of tools for different occasions, usually cannot muster the offensive output that it will need to deal with such extreme lists. On the upside, spam lists make for great TAC lists as well.

Conscripts are good against almost any armies as damage absorbers. You can't really go wrong with them as long as you have buffs to their leadership.

BTW, Brimstones don't have re-roll 1's for their saves. Only Magnus does.

As for your 2nd question, if I do such a battle, I'd have to use a lot of proxies. I don't know of anyone in our area with 9 earthshakers! Earthshakers will scare Magnus but Brimstones will laugh off the damage. Conscripts can tarpit the Brimstones for a while. My main concern would be the Genestealers. They're the ones that will do the majority of the damage. More importantly, this type of list can keep my Brimming With Horrors list from advancing towards the objectives. That would be their main advantage as they can establish Positional Dominance. It would be an interesting battle indeed!

 koooaei wrote:
It'd be a more interesting test if he had a footslogging horde with buff characters. I think that the only competitive units the ork player fielded were warbosses and a garg squiggoth. Dakkajets are just not worth the points and his list consisted of mostly dakkajets.

To be fair, my opponent was just experimenting. At the time of our game, he had played only 4 games. In each of his games, he's tried something different. This game was his first experiment with Dakkajets. I'm sure next time I play against him, it's probably going to be against something completely different (as will be my army). Moreover, he didn't know what I was bringing (other than Chaos) and I didn't know what he was bringing (other than Orks).

gungo wrote:

 koooaei wrote:
It'd be a more interesting test if he had a footslogging horde with buff characters. I think that the only competitive units the ork player fielded were warbosses and a garg squiggoth. Dakkajets are just not worth the points and his list consisted of mostly dakkajets.

even the war bosses were questionable.

Personally I think green tide is strong but can't hold up to the efficiency of gene-cult 40x genestealer swarm w patriarch (detachment 1 ~500pts) backed up by conscript 2x 50 model blob w commissar and commander maybe some scion plasma drops w some taurox gattling guns and crack shot dkok engineers (detachment 2 ~750)and if you really want some heavy hitters or anti flyers back it up w a tyranid detachment w a flyrant or swarmlord and chaff (detachment 3 ~750) or take broken forgeworld artillery that lacks half the rules it should have like manticores that can fire all 4 missiles turn 1 and basilisk carrriagee that cost almost nothing. That's 200+ models that is mostly morale immune and shoots brilliantly and assaults savagely and with a lot of anti tank and anti flyer and some psychers and high invul characters. < post FAQ and without fw fixes to certain artillery this has to be the strongest list.

Sounds scary.

I'm sure there is a lot of other very strong builds out there. This is something that I will have to look into.

mhalko1 wrote:
Honestly the ork player should have 3 way charged magnus with the warbosses and the squiggoth. I'm guessing he was afraid of it dying. But that's an extra unit that gets to attack, more chances for you to split attacks and do less to each unit, plus the squiggoth inflicts d6 mortal wounds when charging. That could have been critical on keeping the warbosses alive.

Well, he retreated with G-Squig so he couldn't charge with it again. My guess was that he planned to charge in the following turn.....that is, if only his 2 warbosses could keep Magnus tied up in combat. Unfortunately for him, Magnus owned them both and then charged G-Squig on my turn.

Man, you dont think the Leviathan is efficent enough? Harsh

it has 20 str 7 -2 d2 shots (sadly.. at 24" range) and 2 HFs for 300ish points!

All at bs2! Its more firepower than 2 riflemans which are only 40 points cheaper.

Is the range that important? Blergh. Dont be true!

I really liked that t8 4++. Le sigh.



How do you feel about the eversor? Worth it?

Largo39 wrote:
Man, you dont think the Leviathan is efficent enough? Harsh

it has 20 str 7 -2 d2 shots (sadly.. at 24" range) and 2 HFs for 300ish points!

All at bs2! Its more firepower than 2 riflemans which are only 40 points cheaper.

Is the range that important? Blergh. Dont be true!

I really liked that t8 4++. Le sigh.



How do you feel about the eversor? Worth it?

Ok, so his shooting is better than I thought and he's more durable than 2 riflemans. However, his range is worrisome to me because:

1. He's more vulnerable to fast assault units. The last thing he wants is to have to retreat from combat and lose a turn of shooting. Either that or you need to spend points for a screening unit for him (though a conscript unit isn't so bad).

2. Against a list such as mine, he'd be Smited to death the turn after he shoots. Unfortunately, Tzeentch don't care about T8 or 2+. Against an army like mine, 2 rifleman dreads are actually slightly more durable!

He's a good dread and a great TAC unit. He's definitely worth considering in any list. It's just that my list is an anomaly because 1) elite units that do well against other elite units don't tend to do well against my army and 2) unless you're running a horde list as well, stay away from my Smite (because you are dead if you can't)! My list can easily generate 20+ mortal wounds a turn if a unit is in range.


The Eversore is a good investment for the points. I see him as a surgical tool to go after strategic units, but I really don't have the experience with him to gauge how'd he'll perform. My guess is that it depends on what the opponent is running. The Eversore could be a steal or he could be a bust depending on the matchup. Not sure whether he will provide consistent, reliable performance but he is cheap enough to risk taking in an army.

 jy2 wrote:

Largo39 wrote:
Man, you dont think the Leviathan is efficent enough? Harsh

it has 20 str 7 -2 d2 shots (sadly.. at 24" range) and 2 HFs for 300ish points!

All at bs2! Its more firepower than 2 riflemans which are only 40 points cheaper.

Is the range that important? Blergh. Dont be true!

I really liked that t8 4++. Le sigh.



How do you feel about the eversor? Worth it?

Ok, so his shooting is better than I thought and he's more durable than 2 riflemans. However, his range is worrisome to me because:

1. He's more vulnerable to fast assault units. The last thing he wants is to have to retreat from combat and lose a turn of shooting. Either that or you need to spend points for a screening unit for him (though a conscript unit isn't so bad).

2. Against a list such as mine, he'd be Smited to death the turn after he shoots. Unfortunately, Tzeentch don't care about T8 or 2+. Against an army like mine, 2 rifleman dreads are actually slightly more durable!

He's a good dread and a great TAC unit. He's definitely worth considering in any list. It's just that my list is an anomaly because 1) elite units that do well against other elite units don't tend to do well against my army and 2) unless you're running a horde list as well, stay away from my Smite (because you are dead if you can't)! My list can easily generate 20+ mortal wounds a turn if a unit is in range.


The Eversore is a good investment for the points. I see him as a surgical tool to go after strategic units, but I really don't have the experience with him to gauge how'd he'll perform. My guess is that it depends on what the opponent is running. The Eversore could be a steal or he could be a bust depending on the matchup. Not sure whether he will provide consistent, reliable performance but he is cheap enough to risk taking in an army.

I am always a proponent for the guilliman parking lot for competitive space marines. Bobby G backing up razorbacks with tacs with heavy weapons and maybe a few dev squads or a few predators. IT's a lot of shooting. Although rifleman dreads are a sub in are a maybe. Not sure.

That said, the space marine flying army remains the best flying army, so spamming storm ravens is probably efficient no matter what you want to do. I'm not sure a brimstone army is gonna stop it, even if you can kill one of them a turn.

@stratigo

Got an example of what a Stormraven Marine list looks like?

Watch Drinkgasoline's batrep report from the Caledonian.

Ok, found an example of a Stormraven list. It goes something like this:

Vanguard Detachment
Commander
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrike

Flyer Wing Detachment
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes


Let's see how much dakka this puts out. Assuming they are firing at 4++ Brimstones with -1 to hit, each Stormraven will on average do:

18 x 1/2 x 2/3 x 1/2 + 2 x 1/2 x 5/6 x 1/2 + 12 x 1/2 x 5/6 x 1/2 + 6 x 1/2 x 2/3 x 1/2 = 6.9 or 7 dead brimstones

6x Stormravens = 7 x 6 = 42 dead Brimstones (not counting Morale yet, which may kill another 18 brimstones if they fire at 2 units of 30).

For comparison, if those 6 ravens fired at tactical marines:

6x [18 x 2/3 x 2/3 x 1/3 + 2 x 2/3 x 5/6 x 5/6 + 12 x 2/3 x 2/3 x 1/2 + 6 x 2/3 x 2/3 x 1/2] = 7.6 x 6 = 46 dead marines

Now let's see how many Ravens it takes to take down Magnus (assuming -1 to hit and only T7):

18 x 1/2 x 1/3 x 1/3 + 2 x 1/2 x 2/3 x 5/12 x 3 + 12 x 1/2 x 5/6 x 5/12 + 6 x 1/2 x 1/3 x 5/12 = 4.33 Wounds = 4W

As Magnus has 18W, it would take 5 stormravens to down him.


So here is how the scenario would play out (keep in mind that this is just a simplified scenario and does not involve real strategy, just pure offense).

If Daemons go first:




If Stormravens go first:

I know it was highly unlikely for the Ork player to have a shot not going first in this game, but I was just wondering the following:

The Ork player had 30 Gretchin, yet on turn 2 you say that you Smited down a Dakkajet while some Gretchin were left to run away in the morale phase at the end of the turn.

Shouldn't the Ork player have moved all his Gretchin directly forward on his turn 1 to ensure that they were all the closest target(s) for all your Smite? It seems like all 30 Grots should have died before any of his Dakkajets were scratched by Smite, or am I missing a reason he didn't do that?

Also I know Magnus is kind of the lynchpin of the army that he was trying to destroy, but once he's T8, it seems like you're almost better off letting Magnus have his way and using all the Dakkajets to put a dent in all those horrors.

It seems as though if he had fired every Dakkajet at horrors starting on turn 1 (and assuming the gretchin had prevented a Dakkajet from being smited to death on turn 1), he could have done a ton of damage (especially with morale).

Plus, on turn 2 when you charged his Squiggoth, it looks like if he had disembarked his Orks and headed straight into your lines with his burna boyz and 2 Warbosses, he could have done more shooting damage with them and maybe even assaulted as well.

Yes, doing that would have meant essentially he had no chance to kill Magnus for the rest of the game, but could he have crippled or eliminated the rest of your army instead if he had focused on that?

It seems to me that would have been the better strategy than trying to pound a square block into a round hole (using anti-horde shooting to try to take down a single behemoth).

Le Sigh. Good to see 8th is really making 40K fun again. I don't have much desire to play any army I own or want to collect/paint against a million horrors or a bunch of planes for that matter. No tournaments this edition it seems - maybe next!

Thanks for the report though! The G-squig seems neat.

....although, I DO have two storm ravens....

 yakface wrote:

I know it was highly unlikely for the Ork player to have a shot not going first in this game, but I was just wondering the following:

The Ork player had 30 Gretchin, yet on turn 2 you say that you Smited down a Dakkajet while some Gretchin were left to run away in the morale phase at the end of the turn.

Shouldn't the Ork player have moved all his Gretchin directly forward on his turn 1 to ensure that they were all the closest target(s) for all your Smite? It seems like all 30 Grots should have died before any of his Dakkajets were scratched by Smite, or am I missing a reason he didn't do that?

Also I know Magnus is kind of the lynchpin of the army that he was trying to destroy, but once he's T8, it seems like you're almost better off letting Magnus have his way and using all the Dakkajets to put a dent in all those horrors.

It seems as though if he had fired every Dakkajet at horrors starting on turn 1 (and assuming the gretchin had prevented a Dakkajet from being smited to death on turn 1), he could have done a ton of damage (especially with morale).

Plus, on turn 2 when you charged his Squiggoth, it looks like if he had disembarked his Orks and headed straight into your lines with his burna boyz and 2 Warbosses, he could have done more shooting damage with them and maybe even assaulted as well.

Yes, doing that would have meant essentially he had no chance to kill Magnus for the rest of the game, but could he have crippled or eliminated the rest of your army instead if he had focused on that?

It seems to me that would have been the better strategy than trying to pound a square block into a round hole (using anti-horde shooting to try to take down a single behemoth).

He had 2 units of Gretchins hiding behind a BLOS terrain that he was saving for late-game objectives grab. Dakkajet was closer to my units than the 3rd unit of gretchins (he didn't want to leave any space for Magnus to land behind his Gretchins to assault G-Squig.

On Turn 1, I didn't get Boon off on Magnus (thus, no T8). However, the -1 bubble discouraged my opponent from shooting at Magnus. On Turn 2, although Magnus was T8 due to Boon, at least he was out of the -1 bubble range. Brimstones, on the other hand, moved back into -1 range. Moreover, Magnus was now a threat to G-Squig and thus must be dealt with (T8 does not affect Dakkajet shooting anyways, only G-Squig's shooting).

T1, he focused all his firepower into 2 30-man Brim squad who, through my mistake, was out of -1 range. He thought he could finish them both off through Morale. It was only after the fact did he realize that it wasn't enough.

He was contemplating charging on T1, but it would have been about a 9" charge due to how far back G-Squig was deployed. Thus, he decided to go for a T2 charge instead. This way, he could charge multiple units and do D6 mortal wounds to each (had he made the 9" charge on T1, he could have done mortal wounds to only 1 unit).

The reason why he didn't disembark those Burnas was that doing so would have gotten them killed. Sure, he might have killed 1 unit of 30-horrors. However, by having them stay inside G-Squiq, they could shoot (at a unit more than 1" away) while protected every single turn after G-Squiq charged. It would have been better, long-term offense rather than a short-term, suicide attack.

Leaving Magnus alive is risky. That would have been a guaranteed kill a turn just from Magnus in addition to all the Smites and shooting from the rest of the army. Keep in mind that Magnus could potentially move 32" a turn with Warptime and that he can assault flyers as well.

Overall, I thought that the decisions he made were sound and reasonable, especially since he couldn't have known how durable my Brimstones would have been.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 kestral wrote:
Le Sigh. Good to see 8th is really making 40K fun again. I don't have much desire to play any army I own or want to collect/paint against a million horrors or a bunch of planes for that matter. No tournaments this edition it seems - maybe next!

Thanks for the report though! The G-squig seems neat.

....although, I DO have two storm ravens....

Haha....you're part-ways there already.

Spam has always been strong and it continues to be so in this edition. It's just a little more noticeable now because you don't have deathstars, armies with 300-500-pts of freebies around, Daemon-summoning and other formerly-strong builds around to obfuscate your vision anymore.

Don't feel discouraged about the tournament scene. Go there with the goal of having fun, not winning the whole darn thing. Besides, these types of builds are probably only 15-20% of the armies at a tournament. Chances are high that you will meet and play against pretty cool people with fun armies that look great.

 kestral wrote:
Le Sigh. Good to see 8th is really making 40K fun again. I don't have much desire to play any army I own or want to collect/paint against a million horrors or a bunch of planes for that matter. No tournaments this edition it seems - maybe next!

Thanks for the report though! The G-squig seems neat.

....although, I DO have two storm ravens....

the meta will likely chagne with the codexes

Well now hold on guys. Lets be honest, 8th is still more fun to play than 7th. Its SO much faster, quicker, and easier and just more fun. I can show up to a GT with 7 pages of datasheets and thats my army. No searching for the book looking for rules or remembering Poison vs Fleshbane vs Sniper... etc. Its just all there on the sheet.

Suddenly the game is more like MtG where you can quickly scan over and see their "deck" and what it can do instead of having to memorize every facet of the codex.


Still, clearly.. there are outlier armies. Overall I think balance is waaayy closer than before, but, horde with either invuln saves OR morale "immunity" is clearly a problem. the good news is that GW/ITC already has an easy knob to turn to fix it. Just raise the points up on horrors/conscripts. Doesnt need to be much, just a point or 2, but that's enough to cut down 200 models to 100 and make it still hordey but doable.

Stormravens also seem to be an early "meta" problem army but there are clear outliers there too. Hurricane bolters for 4 points, for example, is nutso. When that's more efficent then the Taurox Prime's main gatling cannon (18 points for 20 shots vs 16 points for 24 hurricane bolter shots and 48 at 12 inches), which is itself on the line of too good.. you know that needs to change.

But that's the point, it can change, very easily, and very quickly. Its all gonne be okay, haven't even hit a single major event yet


There are some downsides, marines/"elite" armies fundamentally dont work as well with -AP weapons since defense isnt worth the point cost and having 2 wounds doesnt work when multi-damage high volume weapons are pretty prevelent. But that can theoretically be fixed too (FNP, cheaper bodies, etc) Not sure how yet but, it can be.

 jy2 wrote:
Ok, found an example of a Stormraven list. It goes something like this:

Vanguard Detachment
Commander
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
1x Inquisition guy
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrike

Flyer Wing Detachment
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes
Stormraven - Twin AssCan, Twin HB, 2x Hurricane Bolters, 2x Stormstrikes


Let's see how much dakka this puts out. Assuming they are firing at 4++ Brimstones with -1 to hit, each Stormraven will on average do:

18 x 1/2 x 2/3 x 1/2 + 2 x 1/2 x 5/6 x 1/2 + 12 x 1/2 x 5/6 x 1/2 + 6 x 1/2 x 2/3 x 1/2 = 6.9 or 7 dead brimstones

6x Stormravens = 7 x 6 = 42 dead Brimstones (not counting Morale yet, which may kill another 18 brimstones if they fire at 2 units of 30).

For comparison, if those 6 ravens fired at tactical marines:

6x [18 x 2/3 x 2/3 x 1/3 + 2 x 2/3 x 5/6 x 5/6 + 12 x 2/3 x 2/3 x 1/2 + 6 x 2/3 x 2/3 x 1/2] = 7.6 x 6 = 46 dead marines

Now let's see how many Ravens it takes to take down Magnus (assuming -1 to hit and only T7):

18 x 1/2 x 1/3 x 1/3 + 2 x 1/2 x 2/3 x 5/12 x 3 + 12 x 1/2 x 5/6 x 5/12 + 6 x 1/2 x 1/3 x 5/12 = 4.33 Wounds = 4W

As Magnus has 18W, it would take 5 stormravens to down him.


So here is how the scenario would play out (keep in mind that this is just a simplified scenario and does not involve real strategy, just pure offense).

If Daemons go first:

Spoiler:

Turn 1 - Ravens deploy out of range of Smite. Magnus uses Warptime to move 32" and he Smites and then assaults a Raven and kills it.

In return, 4 ravens take him down as he is out of Changeling's -1 bubble. Last raven shoots at Brimstones and kill 7. Another 3 flees due to Morale.

Turn 2 - Next turn, Brimstones/Heralds get in range and kills 1 Raven with Smite. 4 Ravens remain.

4 Ravens return fire, killing 1 unit of 30 Brims with 3 Ravens + Morale. Last Raven shoots at the unit of 20 and brings it down to 10 after Morale.

Turn 3 - Tzeentch army is fully in range now. Smites and shooting from Exalted Flamers bring down 1 more Raven and wounds another. 3 Ravens remaining, of which 1 is damaged.

3 Ravens return fire. They wipe out another 1 unit of Brimstones (80 dead so far, plus Magnus).

Turn 4 - Tzeentch takes out another Raven and nearly kills their 5th Raven as well.

Raven returns fire, killing the unit of 10 and a MSU unit of 10 as well (100 dead).

Turn 5 - Game over. All Ravens killed. Brimstones should be fully camped on the objectives.


Death Toll:

Tzeentch - Magnus, 100 Brimstones

Imperials - nearly tabled, all Stormravens dead

If Stormravens go first:

Spoiler:

Turn 1 - 5 Ravens take out Magnus. Last Raven decides to stay out of Smite range. He stays at 36" and fires only the Stormstrikes and Twin Heavy Bolters, killing 1-2 Brimstones only.

Tzeentch army wastes a turn just trying to get into range.

Turn 2 - Ravens all focus on the Brimstones. 3 Ravens each shoot at a different unit of 30 Brims, killing 21 from each unit. Morale then wipes out both units (62 Brimstones dead, plus Magnus)

Tzeentch army now gets into range. Smite and Exalted Flamer shooting takes out 1 Raven and wounds another.

Turn 3 - 3 Ravens wipe out 1 unit of 30 Brimstones and 2 Ravens combine to kill 23 from another unit (115 dead).

Tzeentch downs a Raven and wounds another one to near-death (2 Ravens down).

Turn 4 - Ravens wipe out another unit of 30, the unit of 5 and manages to kill a Herald that was slightly out of position (150 Brimstones, Magnus and 1 Herald dead).

It only took 2 Smites to down the near-death Raven. Tzeentch still have enough offense to down the 4th Raven (as the majority of their offense is from the Heralds and Exalted Flamers).

Turn 5 - There's no way the Ravens can beat Brimstones in the objectives game. The Imperials just don't have the bodies to take the objectives. Moreover, Tzeentchlings were already occupying the objectives while the flight paths of the Ravens made it hard for them to maneuver their planes to cover the objectives. In the Shooting phase, 2 Ravens shoot down a 20-Brimstone unit (Tzeentch re-adjusted the positions of their Characters such that there were protected by Brimstones once again). 170 down, 90 Brims remaining.

Apparently, Tzeentchlings still have enough firepower to take down a Raven (7 Heralds x 2 mortal wounds + Exalted Flamer shooting). They have the majority of the objectives as well. Game ends. Tzeentch takes it. Had the game continued, it is a possible tabling by 7.


Death Toll:

Tzeentch - Magnus, 1 Herald, 170 Brimstones

Imperials - 5 Stormravens

I think you are taking it too much for granted that you'll be constantly smiting his storm ravens. If your characters are inside those chunky Brimstone units, it isn't particularly hard to force you to waste a few smites on chaff, and if they aren't, the ravens can position to snipe them out.

Remember, ravens don't HAVE to fly anywhere, they can hover, and it's not like you're shooting them or assaulting them with ground units.

The inquisition variance list got nerfed though, those guys used to be 3 wounds a piece (forcing out two smites on average instead of one to deal with).

The raven army is always going to have a positioning advantage, so your smites are gonna have to go through chaff. The primary difference seems, to me, to be in just objective control, but with two or so more ravens up than your raw math indicates, would the death toll be much higher?

@stratigo

Stormraven optimal threat range is 24" (assault cannons and hurricane bolters). Brimstone Smite threat range is 24"+D6" (18" + 6" move + D6" advance). Herald Smite range is 30"+D6" (18" + 6" staff + 6" move + D6" staff). Unless Ravens want to shoot out of Asscan+Hurricane range, majority of Tzeentchlings should be able to get into range to use Smite as Smite out-ranges an optimal Stormraven shooting range.

Tzeentch don't rely on assault, with the exception of Magnus.

I agree that Ravens will have the positioning advantage, as a flying/hovering army should. However, it they get too close to the Tzeentch army, they need to watch out for the Exalted Flamers and their D6 S5 AP -1 auto-hit shots (or worse yet, the Flamers can stand still to fire their D3 lascannon shots). If the Ravens stay away (hover around the 24" range), Brimstones can establish advantageous positions near the objectives.

How much chaff can the army really afford with 6 stormravens in the list? Perhaps 1 Stormraven may survive 1 turn longer? Maybe they even take out another blob of 30-brimstones and even a character. IMO that still may not be enough. You know why? Ok, best-case scenario, somehow you manage to kill all the Brimstones. I then put a character out there. Now your Raven has to waste the entirety of its firepower on that 1 character before it can target another character. If you had 2 Ravens left by the time you kill all the Brimstones and I had 12 characters (Heralds + Flamers), you can only kill 2 characters a turn whereas I can still Smite down 1 raven a turn. In 2 turns you'd kill 3 characters and in return, the Tzeentchlings will have downed both of those ravens.

I just don't think this matchup favors the Stormravens. No matter how you put it, it'll be an uphill battle for them unless the Stormraven general was a much more skilled player than the Tzeentch general (or barring extreme luck).


@Largo39

Agreed. No system is perfect. Each edition will have its strengths as well as its exploitable weaknesses. 8E is no exception. However, I love the simplicity of this edition. You don't need to look up a hundred publications just to find the rules for a unit/combo. I also feel that, despite Spam/Horde/Flyer armies being the early contenders in competitive play, most armies are fairly well balanced out. There are less crazy builds in 8th currently than there were back in 7th (at least for now).

 kestral wrote:
Le Sigh. Good to see 8th is really making 40K fun again. I don't have much desire to play any army I own or want to collect/paint against a million horrors or a bunch of planes for that matter. No tournaments this edition it seems - maybe next!

Thanks for the report though! The G-squig seems neat.

....although, I DO have two storm ravens....

Luckily I don't think this and the razorwing list will last much longer. GW will probably FAQ them into garbage after they sell enough of the models.

 jy2 wrote:

How much chaff can the army really afford with 6 stormravens in the list? Perhaps 1 Stormraven may survive 1 turn longer? Maybe they even take out another blob of 30-brimstones and even a character. IMO that still may not be enough. You know why? Ok, best-case scenario, somehow you manage to kill all the Brimstones. I then put a character out there. Now your Raven has to waste the entirety of its firepower on that 1 character before it can target another character. If you had 2 Ravens left by the time you kill all the Brimstones and I had 12 characters (Heralds + Flamers), you can only kill 2 characters a turn whereas I can still Smite down 1 raven a turn. In 2 turns you'd kill 3 characters and in return, the Tzeentchlings will have downed both of those ravens.

I just don't think this matchup favors the Stormravens. No matter how you put it, it'll be an uphill battle for them unless the Stormraven general was a much more skilled player than the Tzeentch general (or barring extreme luck).

It's not just a bad matchup for spammed Stormravens... I think this Tzeentch army is a bad matchup for just about any extreme low number of unit army trying to get first turn simply because you can easily force your opponent to "waste the entirety of it's firepower on that 1 character before it can target another character."

I agree with Huckleberry and think they are both really lame.

just a question....if this kind of list is so strong, why no one made a win/top3 in latest major tournaments, like Boise cup gt or westcoast gt, just cause players still haven't all the models?

 blackmage wrote:
just a question....if this kind of list is so strong, why no one made a win/top3 in latest major tournaments, like Boise cup gt or westcoast gt, just cause players still haven't all the models?

Pretty much... I don't think most of us has THAT many brimmies.

Frankly I think there's some apprehension in buying all those brimmies before the TzCodex is released.

Ya all the ork flyers are pretty bad. Even in their most ideal match-up, which was this game, they still underperformed - nice paint job on them though

I would be very interested to see this army go up against a proper ork list. Horde pretty much negates smite spam and then it would just end up being an all out duke in combat. That would be a sight to see 100+ orks colliding with 200+ horrors. *heavy breathing*

Ork horde did win wetcoast, so they are competitive. The ravens didn't place in the top 3 either

 whembly wrote:

 blackmage wrote:
just a question....if this kind of list is so strong, why no one made a win/top3 in latest major tournaments, like Boise cup gt or westcoast gt, just cause players still haven't all the models?

Pretty much... I don't think most of us has THAT many brimmies.

Frankly I think there's some apprehension in buying all those brimmies before the TzCodex is released.

A brims list will most likely win a GT in the near future (or certainly place highly). Keep an eye on the BAO